Mental Knowledge, Psychic Knowledge and Faith

0:00 We tend to believe that mental knowledge is based in fact and is certifiable and reproducible, whereas knowledge based in faith is considered to be unreliable or possibly wishful thinking of some sort. Our certainty about our mental knowledge, however, is based heavily on faith. We believe on faith that our perceptions are accurate. On deeper review, we can see that we frequently mistake the accuracy or validity of what we perceive based on a number of factors including misinterpretation, falsehood staged and presented to us as truth, manipulated data, and the filtering process due to our education, past experience, biases, societal norms, and expectations and prejudices.

0:55 With the advent of Photoshop and AI in the digital realm, we are learning that we can trust almost nothing of what we see or hear. Even the major AI engines are known to hallucinate things, make up false references or quotes, and respond based on biases. Built into the way the AI engines interpret the data they are looking at, we can recognize limitations of the mental process and the faith required to rely on it by looking at the errors, omissions, and falsifications that would occur if we were to rely on AI without further verification.

1:36 When our mental process concludes something, we tend not to question it, and thus it is a matter of faith. That is, however, I'll placed when we turn to the question of psychic knowledge, we acknowledge that faith in what we know and experience is an essential part of the process. The faith that we ordinarily attribute to religious beliefs is essentially grounded in the mental process and thus subject to the same kind of failures noted above. The faith that is vested in the psychic knowledge is of a different character. Rather than being based in the mental process, psychic knowledge is something that carries with it the certainty based on the existential force of what comes to us in that manner.

2:26 Just as animals in the vital world instinctively know what to do and how to do it, just as our bodies know how to operate their own functions without mental input, there are certain experiences and intuitions that come to an individual that are self-evident truths of existence. They come with such a force of rightness that the individual simply accepts them for what they are. The vibrational pattern, independent of our biases, prejudices, interpretations, conclusions, analysis, or even the perceptions of the senses, carries its own veracity with it. Paramahan's Yogananda, in his autobiography of a Yogi, relates how he recognized his guru when he met him in person the first time.

3:22 There was no doubt in his mind and the connection was immediate, deep and turned out to last without any break or disruption. He had an experience at the psychic level that told him a truth that his logical mind could not have accepted without a lot of review and consideration. The mother writes quote. The perception of the exterior consciousness may deny the perception of the psychic, but the psychic has the true knowledge, an intuitive instinctive knowledge. It says I know I cannot give reasons, but I know for its knowledge is not mental based on experience or prove true.

4:08 It does not believe after proofs are given. Faith is the movement of the soul, whose knowledge is spontaneous and direct. Even if the whole world denies and brings forward 1000 proofs to the contrary, still it knows by an inner knowledge, a direct perception that can stand against everything, a perception by identity. The knowledge of the psychic is something which is concrete and tangible, a solid mass. You can also bring it into your mental, your vital and your physical. And then you have an integral faith, a faith which can really move mountains. But nothing in the being must come and say it is not like that, or ask for a test by the least half. Belief you spoil matters.

5:02 How can the supreme manifest if faith is not integral and immovable? Faith in itself is always unshakable. That is its very nature, for otherwise it is not faith at all. But it may happen that the mind or vital or the physical does not follow the psychic movement. A man can come to a Yogi and have a sudden faith that this person will lead him to his goal. He does not know whether the person has knowledge or not. He feels a psychic shock and knows that he has met his master. He does not believe after long consideration or seeing many miracles, and this is the only kind of faith worthwhile.

5:46 You will always miss your destiny if you start arguing. Some people sit down and consider whether the psychic impulse is reasonable or not. End Quote. Reference Sri Aurobindo and the Mother, The psychic being soul, its nature, Mission and evolution. Section 1. Meaning and Nature of the Psychic Being, pages 43 to 44.